Is Killing a Dog = Beastilialty???

When Micheal Vick was convicted of dog fighting, the media crushed his career in the hole further than he did himself for being involved in such acts. People were against what he and other people involved was doing. Shouldn't it be the same for nasty, sick individuals who perform beastilialty on animals like dogs, cats, horses, etc...? They may not be killing the animals or making them fight other animals, but they are having sex with animals! The animal is getting hurt in some way, form, or fashion. Ya'll tell me something different.

Depiction of Women in Music Videos (Paper)

After viewing a Top 10 music videos program on FUSE TV in a qualitative and quantitative manner, women were depicted in a sexual way 50 percent of the time in the rock genre videos. Most of the women with leading roles were white and were showed to have a way of demanding attention from those around them in a sexual way.
The previous study by Julie Andsager (Seduction, Shock, and Sales: Research and Functions of Sex in Music Video, 2003) in Chapter 3 (Sex Appeal in Music Videos) of the book Sex in Consumer Culture: The Erotic Content of Media and Marketing (Reichert & Lambiase, 2006) shows how researchers have attempted to capture sexuality in music videos that was difficult to measure and sexual content in videos since the 1981 inception of MTV. Andsager expanded on typology, which regards to how artists’ images are sexualized through music video in order to shape their careers and target their intended fan base.
The most relevant study used was a research thesis by Redelia Shaw (African-American Women in Rap Music Videos: A Visual Formal Analysis, 2004), which discussed how black women were sexualized, and Chapter 10 (Beer, Sex, & Ads) of the book Sex in Consumer Culture: The Erotic Content of Media and Marketing (Reichert & Lambiase, 2006), which discussed how women were being portrayed in media outlets.
I teamed up with Star Ford, Haley Hazard, Holly Smith, and Lindsay Wilson with the goal of finding out the depictions of women in today’s most popular music videos. We used music video outlets such as MTV, BET, VH1, CMT, and my outlet study, FUSE TV to see how women were used and displayed in the videos. During the week of Nov. 12, we took the top 10 videos from each media channel and studied each video for research on our topic.
By monitoring the top 10 music videos on these different outlets, we were attempting to see if:
1. There is a difference in the way woman are dressed?· Low- fully dressed, little to none of body parts showing.· Moderate- appropriate clothing, legs, midriff, or cleavage is barely visible.· High- cleavage is showing, shorts/skirts low cut, body parts showing.
2. There is a difference in the ways which females in videos are portrayed? Their roles: · The victim- reliance the man, sad, hurt etc.· Sexual- sexually interested, experienced, etc.· Party girl- fun, social, club girl, etc.· The other woman- home wrecker, sexualized to tempt the man, etc.
3. There is a difference in the role and race of the leading lady.
4. What is the different genre of music within the media channels chosen?
Each of these questions will be broken down into different categories and defined by the music channel. If there weren’t any leading ladies or females in the music video, then the response in each category was N/A.
I covered the FUSE TV channel outlet. There wasn’t a host for their top 10 countdown. The show just started on cue and went into the #10 video. All the videos on this program were of the rock and pop genres. After a close analysis, I conducted information about how the women in the videos were being depicted.
The No. 10 video was “Empty Walls” by Serj Tankian. This was a rock video that didn’t have a leading woman, but instead had children playing joyfully. Everyone was dressed very low.
The No. 9 video was “Big Casino” by Jimmy Eat World. This was a rock video that didn’t have any women in the video and everyone else was dressed low.
The No. 8 video was “Everything We Had” by The Academy Is… This was a soft rock video that had a white woman playing the role of the victim. She was dressed in both a moderate and highly fashion.
The No. 7 video was “Southern Weather” by The Almost. This was a rock video and there wasn’t any women present in this video.
The No. 6 video was “Woke Up Next To You” by Fall Out Boy. This was a pop video that had a African woman playing the role of an independent woman. She was dressed real poor and low.
The No. 5 video was “Pretty Handsome Awkward” by The Used. This was a rock video that had a white dressed as a transvestite. He was dressed in a high manner.
The No. 4 video was “Your Guardian Angel” by The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. This was a rock video that didn’t have any women in it and everyone was dressed low.
The No. 3 video was “Crushcrushcrush” by Paramore. This was a rock that had a white woman playing the role of a sexual, demanding woman. She was moderately dressed.
The No. 2 video was “Almost Easy” by Avenged Sevenfold. This was a rock video that didn’t have any women in it. The men in the video were dressed in a moderate fashion.
And finally, the No. 1 video was “You Are the One” by Shiny Toy Guns. This was a rock video that displayed the women in the video to be independent and free-spirited. They were dressed highly.
When one compares the previous study to this study on music videos, one might find the same patterns of how women are depicted. With FUSE TV, only 50 percent of the videos had women in them and 3 of the 5 videos within that 50 percent had the women dressed in a sexual manner. It was no surprise to see that the No. 1 video had women it displaying themselves as sexual icons. That’s what sells in today’s world. When will it change or better yet, should it ever change? Society will only have the answer to that.








References
FUSE TV Top 10 Countdown. Retrieved: November 12, 2007.
Lambiase, Jacqueline & Reichert, Tom. (2006). Sex in Consumer Culture: The Erotic Content of Media And Marketing. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.Shaw, Redelia. (2004). African American Women in Rap Music Videos: A Visual Formal Analysis (Research Thesis, Georgia State University, 2004). Retrieved from ProQuest.

Pimp C's Death

What is going on in the rap world? Pimp C of UGK died in his sleep the other day and people think he did it to himself. When you're a rapper in today's world, you can be depicted as anything you want I guess. Pimp C wasn't just a rapper, but he was also an important family member and friend to others. Not just what people assumed he was (Pimp, Drug Dealer & User, Gangster, etc...)

Media Attention on Sean Taylor

Before Sean Taylor died from a gunshot wound to the groin, he was being viewed as a "thug" and gangster of some sort simply because he hung around his friends he knew from school in Miami. Before he actually died, Taylor was being looked in a good light for a moment and when he died people went to saying that he should've hung around better people. People, it doesn't matter who you are. If you have money and lots of it, then you are always a target to people less fortunate. R.I.P. Sean Taylor #21

Depictions in Hollywood Shuffle

Much like the racial depictions shown in Spike Lee's film Bamboozled, Robert Townsend's film Hollywood Shuffle showed much of the same depictions. Townsend's film shows how black people are portrayed in Hollywood showing how they are supposed to be rappers, dancers, gangsters, pimps, athletes, etc...in Hollywood films. Lee's film showed how people react to black people's action whenever they are told to act stupid compared to just acting sophisticated.

Check a clip from the movie!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLdDqhtkDNY

Teenage Sex = Hip-Hop? No.

Hip-Hop shouldn't get all the blame for teenagers having sex early. It's the world that we live in. We may hear sexual lyrics and stuff and see sexual videos on T.V., but we also see sexual acts in movies everywhere. Why not question the movie writers? People need to just sit back about hip-hop causing everything and look at the world around them.

Video Game Depictions

Has anyone ever played Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas? If you have, you'll notice how the majority of the people are Black or Mexican and are portrayed as gangsters and thugs of some sort. They operate heavy artillery and kill at will. The white people are either the innocent people walking the streets of San Andreas or the head boss of a firm or mafia. The game is very violent and a lot of children play this game. Ya'll should check it out if you haven't already. This isn't new news.

Dog The Bounty Hunter's Comments

The Dog said some stuff the other day that almost ended his career. Like Don Imus, Dog crossed the line with using racial words. He was recorded saying racial things about his son's black girlfriend and said that if he stayed with her she would eventually ruin their career on T.V. Here is a link for more info on it.

http://edition.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/TV/11/01/dog.chapman.ap/index.html

Black or African-American?

This issue about race and culture has been going on forever. Black people are considered to be a race or group of people that come from African descent. Not only in America, but all around the Caribbean area and France, there are different types of African descent. America is a melting pot for all kind of races and accounts for a large number of different black people. It is only right to name those people blacks or negroes so people can be identified easier. The same goes for other races as well. I'm black/African-American and I think others like me should be identified the same. I might not have grew up in Africa and then moved to America, but I have African ancestors from the continent of Africa, so that makes me equal to a true African.

Axe Spray Song

Lets face it, sex will always sell no matter what people say or think about it. I agree with what Axe is doing with their campaign. It's a spray designed for men and most men relate with women in a major way. I would use the same strategy if I was on board of the advertising/marketing team. The Bom Chika Wah Wah song and video is funny, but a great marketing tool.

Cleveland School Shooting Coverage

I just read about the school shooting that took place in Cleveland recently and I don't think that there was any justice in the way the writers handled the race issue. In most news articles, you are suppose to first identify what the situation is and then state who is involved. When stating who is involved, you give a accurate description of who the persons are. The writers didn't identify Asa's race until close to the end of the story, but did manage to give the other kids, which were 85 percent black, a bad look as if they were all bad people. They even made Asa, the 14-year-old shooter, look very bad since he did shoot four people. He was probably a good kid that was driven bad, but from reading the story, one wouldn't be able to tell that off top.

Latino's Image in World War 2

It is of shock to me that Latinos were involved in World War 2. I never thought about their contribution to the war I guess because I was never informed about their participation. This just goes to show how media portrays certain races and that something or somebody always has to make a big deal about a situation for some justice to be serve. But, thats our world today and I couldn't see it any different.

Jena 6 Coverage

I've just recently viewed a video on The Dallas Morning News website covering Jena 6 and I think they covered it in a positive way, being it was a positive event going on. Anytime there is a group of people marching or doing something in a non-violent way to solve a problem is always gonna bring positve media. At least for people like Dallas Morning News. I haven't seen it yet, but I wouldn't be shocked to see news outlets in Louisianna or Jena to blow the situation up making it seem as if everybody is making this situation bigger than what it is. I'm glad to see coverage this event though because for a while I didn't even know this was going on. I still can't believe how racist some places are still! Me being a black male, who is to say it couldn't have been me? Everybody seems to be on the same page across the nation backing up these young men. I've seen support on Myspace and Facebook as well too. As long people make a big deal about situations like this and keep doing it, the Louisianna law system will have no choice but to make change for the better.

My News Habits

The way that I recieve the news is mainly through the television. Thats everything from local, national, sports, etc... I also get my news through the internet and newspapers. I see different types of news almost everyday now. Mostly on the internet. I like to read about sports and entertainment news both online and offline. I guess thats what I can relate to as of right now. If I was to add up the hours in which I look at news coverage, it'll probably round up to about 3-4 hours. I think that when the news hit subject matters of race and gender, they are purposely making that subject an everyday target because thats what people are immune to hearing and seeing in the world today.